


A Tradition With Punching

by okoriwadsworth



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-09
Updated: 2020-12-09
Packaged: 2021-03-10 03:08:36
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27977124
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/okoriwadsworth/pseuds/okoriwadsworth
Relationships: Laurel Lance/Oliver Queen
Comments: 4
Kudos: 9





	A Tradition With Punching

It was something of an odd holiday tradition. It started on the first Christmas when they were training with Lady Shiva and Richard Dragon in Vietnam. Knowing they were missing their families and their friends; their trainers took Oliver and Laurel out for drinks and dinner. But what the Green Arrow and the Black Canary didn’t know is that their trainers had planned for some “field testing” of their new students. The last thing either of them wanted was to train them in everything they knew, and then hear through the grapevine that their students were crippled or killed due to lack of proper field time. Even for Lady Shiva, for whom emotional reactions were something to be avoided, the thought of that was disquieting.

So, while their young charges were excited about a night away from dojos and katas, Lady Shiva and Richard Dragon knew what they were going to be ending up doing. Tonight, they would be going into Hanoi and they would be heading to a bar known to be run, and populated, by the Vietnamese mafia. What would come next, they hoped, was that their students would immediately rise to the challenge.

So that night, Dinah Laurel Lance and Oliver Jonas Queen walked into a bar and ended up clearing it out as their teachers looked on in pride. With no problem at all, the soon-to-be defenders of Starling City walked through the toughest people in Vietnam.

But, honestly, it was a cool memory for two people who were entirely focused on becoming the best versions of themselves that they could be. They were away from their friends and family, a time that was supposed to be a romantic vacation but had been warped into something else, and wanted nothing more than to get back home to them.

But soon, in that first year back home, it turned into something else. After stopping a drug ring, Oliver got down on a knee and proposed to Laurel. They had been through so much pain, so much loss. And somehow, their love had not weakened. If anything, it had strengthened. Oliver wanted to make that official. 

They were so wired on adrenaline, love, and joy that they didn’t want to go to sleep just yet. But as they drove to their home to spar, needing some way to burn this off, an exhausted-sounding Curtis Holt radioed through and told them that the Triad, the Yakuza, the West Side Street Mob, and the Sons of Samoa had all congregated at the Salty Dog bar and it looked like a brawl was about to break out.

If you had lived in Starling City for longer than 6 months, you knew one did not go to the Salty Dog unless you were looking for trouble, or personified it. Starling City was still trapped between two worlds. One was the working-class port city where people worked as stevedores, air traffic controllers, and loggers. The other was the technological hub where aerospace, the defense industry, and bleeding-edge tech employed the richest and smartest. The gap between those two cities, between those two visions of what Starling City was supposed to be, meant that a lot of people fell through the cracks. And with the abominable state of the social services in the city, those cracks were filled up by gangs.

So, when the Green Arrow and the Black Canary walked to that bar, they knew what they were doing. They were going to do their part, no matter how small, to end the hold these gangs had on the city.

Kicking in the door of the club, the Green Arrow and Black Canary started immediately. From low-rent thugs to neighborhood presidents, everyone came after them and everyone found their skills not good enough. Before too long, the floor of the bar looked like a tornado had hit it. Broken bones, concussions, and more than a few people thrown through windows and slumped over tables.

Smiling, Oliver and Laurel looked around and put ads for getting out of the life were placed on the table for those in this brawl who wanted out. For those who didn’t, phone calls to the city’s gang unit were made.

All in all, they felt like they had done something. Good night’s work.


End file.
